Butterfly, By José Luis Cuerda

“Day of the Butterfly” by Alice Munro is a story involving two girls and their short lasting friendship. In their sixth grade class, Myra does not socialize. She spends most of her time taking care and watching her little brother Jimmy. For the first time in years one of her classmates, Helen, feels slightly bad for her and makes an effort to connect with her. Right after their meeting, Myra is sick with leukemia and she becomes the most talked about person among her peers. They visit her in the hospital bringing gifts and kind words. Helen also brings a gift for her but feels that everything her classmates have given Myra are “guilt-tinged offerings”. They have similarities and differences. Myra and Helen are both are poor and

Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer is a very influential novel in the military. In fact, it is required reading material for all 1st Lieutenants in the Marine Corps as well as in the United States Military Academy at West Point. Many Army leaders have read the book and often discuss it among themselves in social situations. Although a fiction read, many leaders extrapolate the use of mission command as well as the leaderships attributes. In this analysis I will be comparing a single event in the novel to the Army’s leadership principles as well as Mission Command. I will then provide a personal reflection and conclude.

In Mario Puzo 's book The Fortunate Pilgrim, he highlights the struggles of Italian immigrants coming to America through one family. Using the Angeluzzi-Corbo family Puzo is able to show the struggles of living in a new country, giving up old ways, and adapting to new customs. He shows the immigrants struggles the best by using Lucia Santa, the mother and the rock of the Angeluzzi-Corbo family. By using Lucia, Puzo is able to make the reader see her struggle of keeping her family safe from the harshness of the outside world. Lucia is mainly concerned that her children do not lose the Italian ways and that she can continue to provide for her family. While reading the book the reader can see how Lucia struggles keeping all six of her

Believing that there are things worth risking your life for is a quality that is well respected.

His most perfect love in all the world was on that train. So he’d run to the end of the earth if he had to(Pg. 120). Juan Villasenor, one of the two major characters in Rain of Gold, a nonfiction novel by Victor Villasenor, faces many problems throughout the book that have a significant impact on the skullduggery little boy we knew from the beginning to the scrupulous and surreptitious man at the end. In Rain of Gold, it follows the sides of 2 characters, Juan, Lupe, and their families during the time of the Mexican Revolution, as they travel from Mexico to America, and go through many struggles on this voyage. In these obstacles, Juan faces from beginning to end, he learns many things on this journey and meets new people that change his

In David Hwang’s play, M. Butterfly, the story covers the superior attitude that Western white men hold toward Eastern oriental women which is shown through Rene Gallimard’s experiences. Throughout the story, Gallimard constantly brings up his favorite play, M. Butterfly, where an oriental woman, Butterfly, gives up and loses everything including her life for the white man she loves, Pinkerton, and despite Butterfly’s efforts, Pinkerton ends up marrying another woman causing Butterfly to commit suicide. Many white men enjoy this play because it portrays white men to look superior and gives them the assumption that oriental women would do and give up anything for a white man. Gallimard is also one of the white men who believe they are superior to oriental women and that no matter what he does, an oriental woman would never leave his side. Gallimard 's belief of racial superiority is what led him to his control over Song as if Gallimard was Pinkerton and Song was his Butterfly, this fantasy that Gallimard created for himself was false because in reality, Gallimard was the Butterfly and Song was the Pinkerton.

Born in 1803, in the village of La Côte-Saint-André, France, Hector Berlioz produced some of the most invigorating and exciting music of the Romantic period (Holoman, 1, 6). Romanticism primarily focused on subjectivism, therefore people were concentrating more on their emotions and spirituality and less on logical explanations for the problems of humanity. Those of the Romantic period valued nature and depended upon the creativity of artists in order to gain a deeper and different outlook on the world, one that was not strictly rational. Of all the Romantic art forms, music, especially

"The novel Cage of Butterflies primarily explores how scientific research can become corrupted by the profit motive."

Sympathy between humans stretches a far distance, but for other beings more extraordinary compassion is thrown away at the first sight of difference. Between the two supernatural beings in Gabriel Marquez’s “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings”, one gets more kindness and awe from the ordinary people because of her human origins; while the other supernatural being, an old man with wings, is mistreated. The differences between the two being’s origins portray human nature and its detriments. That is the human nature Marquez portrays in the villagers treatment of the two paranormal beings. Treatment of supernatural beings by humans depends on an explanation of their origin and how they came about.

After reading “How to Tame a wild Tongue” by Gloria Anzaldua, I can definitely feel the social and cultural difficulties immigrants experienced while being raised in the United State in a profound way. So it brings up a question I have as an immigrant for a long time: Would we get treated differently if we act the same way they act, speak the same kind of language they speak, eat the same type of food they eat? If we accomplish all of those things, would they consider us like them? Or would they still see us as outsiders and always keep a distance away from us? Will we have better interactions with them? Or will we still have to hang out with those people who are same races as us? By reading “Do We Really Want Immigrants to Assimilate?”, Nathan Glazer posed the question: “Is Assimilation Dead?” three years ago and his answer was yes to this concern. Though he stressed the fact that assimilation still making the progress toward society, on the one side I agree with his notion that assimilation insists a social reality but on the other side, I strongly disagree with the idea that assimilation is dead as nation ideal. So should immigrant assimilate? There are many benefits of being multicultural and one should try their best to accommodate majority’s needs.

The Underdogs by Mariano Azuela is arguably the most important novel of the Mexican Revolution because of how it profoundly captures the atmosphere and intricacies of the occasion. Although the immediate subject of the novel is Demetrio Macias - a peasant supporter of the Mexican Revolution -, one of its extensive themes is the ambivalence surrounding the revolution in reality as seen from a broader perspective. Although often poetically revered as a ‘beautiful’ revolution, scenes throughout the novel paint the lack of overall benevolence even among the protagonist revolutionaries during the tumultuous days of the revolution. This paper will analyze certain brash characteristics of the venerated revolution as represented by Azuela’s

“I usually make a fortune on Saturdays, selling to those kids going down to Belmar or out to Spruce Run.” (Drown). The narrator, Yunior, in the story Drown by Junot Diaz is a drug dealer and does not want anyone to recognize him so that he may uphold a positive image. Unlike Yunior in “Drown” the narrator in the poem What Work Is by Philip Levine depicts the struggles men and women face when trying to obtain honest work. “We stand in the rain in a long line waiting at Ford Highland Park, for work” (What Work Is). The two-literary works both suggest one must live a life of chance when work is hard to come by.

This critique written by Roberto Gonzalez Echevarria of In the Time of the Butterflies focuses mainly on the political facts that are not apparent in the novel. He states that Alvarez makes her novel appear blurry, not making it a “serious historical fiction.” However, the critical commentary that Echevarria made would not necessarily apply to the film due to the fact that Alvarez’s intentions are to initially expose readers to life in the Dominican Republic under the control of Trujillo, rather than have it be a serious historical fictional novel with facts and real life events. In fact, the film focused more on the historical aspect of this time period unlike Alvarez’s novel. It provided slow motion slide shows of Trujillo’s

If you were able to imprison a decrepit, senile old man in your backyard and make a large sum of money just to keep him, would you do it? The classic short story “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” by Gabriel Marquez does just that, only this old man has wings. While exploring human nature and the reactions a person and people have to adversity and difference, Marquez makes some pointed criticisms of society in general. With many underlying themes and symbols, I’ll be analyzing a few such as; greed, compassion, the magical realism genre and the subtle jabs at Catholicism Marquez makes throughout the story.

I chose to watch the movie La Lengua de las Mariposas; which translates to ‘The Tongue of the Butterflies’. I did not know what movie to watch originally but I remembered learning the word ‘mariposas’ from my high school Spanish teacher. Also, this movie came up on two separate lists when I searched for a movie to watch for this assignment.